As Halloween (31 October) approaches, many of us will be spending the weekend carving pumpkins and decorating our homes with them in ready for trick-or-treating or a spooky themed party or meal.
Once the celebrations are over, help to reduce food waste by using up any pumpkin leftovers to cook up something tasty. STAUB’s creamy pumpkin soup recipe below is easy to make and can be adapted to make use of any type of in-season pumpkin or squash you have to hand.
STAUB’s cast iron Pumpkin Cocotte is the perfect autumnal design for cooking and serving this dish, and if there are any leftovers for the week ahead, these can be kept fresh for up to five times longer with ZWILLING’s FRESH & SAVE vacuum storage solution.
Ingredients – Serves 4
40g chickpeas
1200g Hokkaido pumpkin (or any pumpkin or squash of your choice)
3 onions
80g fresh ginger
2 tbsp. clarified butter
4 tbsp. curry powder
500ml chicken stock
100g butter
200ml coconut milk or cream
Freshly ground salt and pepper
Juice from one lime
100g kale
Pumpkin seed oil, as preferred
Pumpkin seeds, as preferred
Method
1. Steep the chickpeas in cold water overnight. The next day, boil them in water for 30-40 minutes until soft. Drain the water through a sieve and place the chickpeas to the side. Quarter the pumpkin, remove the seeds, and finely dice 100g for the topping. Chop the remaining pumpkin into large cubes for the soup. Peel and finely chop the onions. Peel and finely grate the ginger.
2. Heat the clarified butter in a pot. Brown the onions, ginger and pumpkin in the pot for 3 minutes, dust with curry powder and allow to briefly sweat. Add the chicken stock to the soup base. Cover with the pot lid and allow to simmer over a mild heat for around 30 minutes.
3. Once the pumpkin is soft, add the 70g butter and coconut milk and finely puree everything with a hand blender. Generously season the pumpkin soup with salt, pepper and lime juice.
4. Wash the kale, shake dry, remove the leaves from the stems and chop coarsely. Brown the diced pumpkin in a pan with the remaining 30g butter, add the chickpeas and kale and briefly toss, seasoning with salt.
5. Serve the soup with the browned topping. You can also garnish and serve with pumpkin seed oil and pumpkin seeds as desired.
